A Race Car Design Build Test Project For Low Income, First Generation Pre College Students

There is much interest in developing curricula to help K-12 students understand what an engineer does in order to further interest in engineering. Students have misconceptions on what engineers do and how they impact society. This paper presents results of how a small group (N=12) of high school junior’s attitudes towards engineering changed based on an introduction to electrical engineering summer course where students built and tested a computer controlled radio control (RC) car. The students—the first generation to consider attending college—were drawn from low-income households in the six-county area surrounding an Oklahoma State University. The purpose of the six week intervention, part of a campus-wide Upward Bound program was to give students a realistic view of engineering as a career option. To evaluate the effectiveness of the intervention two assessments were used. A pre-post Draw an Engineer 1 with a written component was used to measure perceptions of engineers. More students self-identified themselves as engineers following the intervention. Overall the draw an engineer shows an increased understanding of what is involved in engineering. Post-intervention interviews also examined students’ changes in attitudes about engineering. Interview data indicates increases in student intentions to pursue engineering and that the format of the intervention gave students a realistic view of engineering.